As Coppin State closed what had been a nine-point gap against the GW women’s basketball team in the second half of Thursday’s game, there was one and only one collective memory GW head coach Mike Bozeman could cite as a rallying point for his young team: Tuesday’s season-opening win at North Texas.

“The only thing I could draw off of was the last game we just played,” Bozeman said with a laugh before explaining that he told his 10 underclassmen, “Okay, we’ve been here before. Just relax.”

Though there was little experience from which to draw, the young Colonials did not seem daunted in the face of a blown lead and a hot-shooting Eagles team, matching them bucket for bucket before pulling ahead and securing a 68-64 win to move to 2-0 on the season.

The teams were tied at 64 when freshman Megan Nipe knocked down a jumper for her first and only field goal to break the tie in the Colonials’ favor. Freshman Danni Jackson found sophomore Sara Mostafa for a short jumper just under a minute later to give GW a four-point lead that they held for the final 24 seconds.

Sophomore Tiana Myers led the Colonials with a career-high 18 points, with Mostafa adding 14 points to go with seven rebounds and four blocks.

Mostafa, who set career highs in all three categories Tuesday at North Texas after averaging just six minutes per game as a freshman last season, has quickly grown into an increased role and is quick to attribute her success to the play of her teammates.

“It helps a lot getting amazing passes from Danni,” Mostafa said. “She just makes it easy.”

Bozeman had similarly high praise for the 5-foot-3 freshman guard after the game.

“I like eight assists and one turnover,” he said, referring to Jackson’s statistics in the win when asked what he liked about her play. “I don’t have to say anything else.”

The Colonials enjoyed an 18-0 scoring advantage on fast breaks in the game, with Myers adding a handful of transition layups to arrive at her career-best point total.

“We just ran and they didn’t really get back on defense and then we capitalized on their mistakes,” Myers explained.

Bozeman said the team’s squandering of its large first-half lead was both an example of the team’s talent level and inexperience, but that he was ultimately satisfied with the game’s result.

“You’d rather learn your lessons through winning than learn lessons in losses, so I’ll take this close win,” he said.

GW’s season continues Sunday with a 1 p.m. game at Ohio.